


Losing Geralt

by AnneTaylor



Series: When Wolves Fall [6]
Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, F/M, M/M, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-20
Updated: 2020-02-23
Packaged: 2021-02-19 14:15:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22812373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AnneTaylor/pseuds/AnneTaylor
Summary: Geralt has been taken by the witch. Yennefer and Jaskier are preparing to get him back. Yen thinks she’s ready. Jaskier thinks he is prepared. Neither of them has any idea what is coming.There is some major hurt going on in this story. Don't read it if torture is triggering to you. Everyone is going to be traumatized. But they will get through it, I promise. No character death.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion, Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Yennefer z Vengerbergu | Yennefer of Vengerberg
Series: When Wolves Fall [6]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1621207
Comments: 11
Kudos: 67





	1. Entering the Witch's Lair

Yennefer rolled her eyes. The bard looked terrified. She must be wearing her scary face, as Geralt called it. When Yennefer was pushing the borders of sanity and common sense.

He also looked exhausted. How long had he been pushing himself and his mount to scale the mountain, probably without more than a token rest every now and then? Roach had been limping and all but stumbling.

 _Curse you, Borch. We should have all been together by now. The three of us, training up your baby dragons. Instead, Geralt is missing and I don't know why or who the fuck has him. All I know is you’ve left us on our own again_.

She smoothed her expression and took a sip of her apple juice. The taste of it reminded her of Geralt's mouth. “First strategic decision when creating a portal; transparent or opaque?”

“They have the advantage of longer preparation,” Jaskier pointed out. “Transparent would give you more warning. But opaque would make it more difficult for the enemy to aim.”

So the bard was a tactician? If only he'd been there at Soddem…but there were no tactics that would have protected them from the portal that appeared unexpectedly, releasing a deadly spray of arrows into their unprotected bodies. Other than armor. Or force walls. We were arrogant. We trusted to our power to win. The enemy used treachery and cunning. It was ironic; she had once told Geralt that nobody smart plays fair. I wish I had been able to convince them of that. Tricks and illusions...how could she use that to her advantage?

Then an idea occurred to her. “Ah. Of course.” She gestured, bringing up a shimmering disc of light between her fingers. “Bend the light this way and it becomes mirror. I can tie that into the appearance of the portal.”

“You can see her, but she can't see you...you can do that?” Jasper gave his head a shake. “Of course she can do that.”

She smothered a smile. “You should take a nap. There.” She offered him her bed. “I need to make preparations. You won't have more than fifteen minutes but I'm guessing you can make use of it.

As usual, she was right.

* * *

It was more like half an hour before she went to shake the bard. He came awake with a cry and a start, sitting bolt upright on the bed. “If you have to piss do it outside,” she told him, pointing at the door.

He came back in with a wide-eyed look of awe. “Quite a view you have in your backyard,” he managed.

There was a softly glowing sphere surrounding the floor crystal, large enough that it could completely contain the portal. Red fire energies, which would incinerate anything that came through. With any luck the witch would send the bulk of her forces in the first wave. Of course, it would have to be taken down before they went in after Geralt. There were also two items laid on the table, ready to be picked up.

Geralt’s silver sword, which wouldn't do much against a witch but it might against things a witch might summon or commanded.

And a crossbow. Not magic. Not blessed. Just wood and metal and sinew. She had learned a few things from Soddem. Things that would stop or detect a magic attack wouldn't even notice a piece of wood and iron.

“That will be helpful.” Jaskier went to pick up the silver sword.

“Leave it!” Yennefer commanded. She’d need it when she went through.

He dropped it. “I can use a sword,” he protested with a mildly hurt look on his face.

His lack of vehemence told her volumes. “I've been using a sword since before you latched onto your mother's tits.”

His face fell. “What about the crossbow?”

“Ever shot one?”

“Geralt spent half a day trying to teach me once,” he admitted. “I wasn't much good.”

“Good enough.” She never had the time to learn. The crossbow had come from the master weaponsmith who sold her the sword that was even now sitting on the top of her cupboard, gathering dust since she returned from Vizima

Jaskier picked up the crossbow. He sighted down its length. “Bolts?”

“Under the bed.”

He got down on his hands and knees and peered into the darkness beneath the bed-skirts. He froze. “Interesting collection you have down here,” he said in a strangled voice. He retrieved the crossbow bolts.

“Some of them are Geralt's.” She wasn't sure what imp of viciousness had led her to that statement. Certainly, some of the items under her bed were Geralt's. She had emptied his backpack and shoved them under the bed after their shopping trip to Vizima, but it was unlikely that any of the items the bard was referring to were Geralt's. Souvenirs of her time in Rinde. Orgies were such...interesting opportunities.

She saw Jaskier’s Adam’s apple work its way up and down his throat. He scrambled up with his handful of crossbow bolts.

“I'm going to put the bracelet on now, then open the portal. Be ready.”

He nodded, and she reached for the bracelet.

* * *

She knew, the moment that the portal was up, that there was something wrong. It felt like there was something on the other side, sucking her power away.

Fuck. What could do that? Witches couldn’t create portals and didn’t understand them.

There was a woman on the other side, watching her. The mirror effect obviously wasn’t working. Behind her was a tightly woven wall of tree branches. Any doubt that Yennefer had that she was facing a witch vanished. The wall writhed, tendrils and branches spreading and shifting, always in motion. No sorceress could have animated anything that realistically.

The woman was beautiful. Her long dark hair rippled down her back in waves. Her lips were full and red, her cheeks a delicate rose. Her green eyes looked too large for her face.

Enhanced. Skillfully. The woman wore a many layered silk dress, in shades of emerald and pale lime. The lines of the bodice pulled her full breasts together and wrapped behind her neck and around her throat. Cascades of crystal hung from her ears.

“I have been waiting for you, Yennefer of Vengenberg.”

Suddenly the wall of branches erupted, pointed tentacles of wood driving into Yennefer’s portal. They burnt to a crisp against the wall of fire.

The woman smiled. “So glad you aren’t easy, my darling,” she cooed. “That would have been so disappointing. I’d have made do, of course, but this is far more satisfying.” She tilted her head, inquiringly.

“I’m not really sure why you think I’ll waste my time with you.” Yennefer interjected a note of boredom into her voice. The woman was obsessed, fine, she could work with that. “What do you want? Who are you, anyway? Not that I care.”

“You aren’t asking the right questions,” the woman pouted. “What you should be asking is ‘Pain, what have you been up to while you were waiting for me to arrive?’ It’s a very important question, you see.”

The woman was insane. Not just in your typical evil sadist way, but in a way that made Yennefer shudder at the sickness that dwelled in her spirit. The madness sloughed off her in waves, like the black ooze that sloughed from the skin of drowners. Jaskier had backed away and was watching from the far side of the room.

“Go ahead, then. Tell me.”

“No, you have to ask. And use my name.”

Uneasily, Yennefer wondered if maybe she didn’t want to know the answer to the question. “Pain? That’s your name?”

“It is.” The words seemed forced from the woman’s lips. Her eyes were fever bright.

“Pain, what have you been up to?”

“Playing.” The woman gestured and the wall of branches parted.

A naked man hung from the ceiling. Livid burns and green and purple bruises mottled his body. Blood seeped from cuts crisscrossed his chest and thighs.

It was Geralt.


	2. Through A Portal

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Geralt has been captured and tortured by a witch who wants revenge, and it is up to Yennefer and Jaskier to save him. But how can they, when their enemy has taken them all to the brink of despair?

His body was chained at the wrists but was partially supported by a branch that wound around his chest, roots grown into his flesh. His skin was inflamed and oozing blood where the roots entered.

“He’s been waiting. I told him you would come for him, to rescue him, but he said he didn’t believe me. I think he lied, though.” She stepped back through the opening and turned to face Yennefer, running her hands down Geralt’s body, watching Yennefer. “Such a strong one, he is. So silent. Except when he screams. He has endured wounds that men have died of just from the pain alone.”

I am so fucking tired of people like her. Maybe if I strike hard and fast enough. Yennefer sent a bolt of power through the portal but it fizzled away to nothing before reaching the barrier. She felt whatever was on the other side of the portal trying to suck power from her and she dropped the spell immediately. Dimertium. The room must be filled with it.

“You’d better hurry. I’ve been helping him out you see, but from now on, he’s on his own.” The branch ripped itself from Geralt’s flesh. He gave a grunt of pain. His golden eyes flew open as the branch uncoiled and dropped him, leaving him suspended by his arms.

She could see the small, writhing movements of his muscles; the body's response to an inescapable pain. 

How long had he been hanging there?

A subtle scent brushed over her senses. It smelled like rot. Despair. _I want to die…_

Geralt’s bloodied fingers lost their grip on the chains and his body dropped. The strain on his chest left him gasping for air. His fingers curled and the muscles of his arm tensed but he hadn't the strength to pull himself up. As she watched, the labored gasps shortened.

“He'll suffocate,” said Jaskier urgently. She hadn’t seen him come up beside her.

Any force that she might have sent to support Geralt would have been absorbed by the dimertium. She ran through a dozen possibilities in her head and none of them offered any hope.

“Fuck this!” Jaskier snarled savagely, and darted through the portal.

The desperate fool actually managed to wiggle through the tangle of vines to make it to Geralt's side. He seized Geralt around the hips and lifted.

The tautness on Geralt's arms eased and his breathing returned with a gasp.

Yennefer waited. _He's helpless_. A knife between the ribs. A thin cord about the throat. That damned bard has just stuck another dagger into his friend's heart. Geralt would be forced to watch him die. And it was all so unnecessary. The witch wasn’t about to let her bait die.

The witch smiled. Her eyes engaged with Yennefer's as she buckled a collar around the bard's neck. “Hold him up,” she told the bard, her voice as sweet as rotting fruit. “Don't let him suffocate.”

“I intend to,” the bard's snapped furiously. His eyes sought Yennefer’s, desperate and terrified.

He doesn't know what to do next. He's expecting me to come up with something. A creature born of impulse and heart, was the bard. Not big on planning.

 _That's my job, now_. It hadn't always been. First Tissaia had thrown her into the leadership role, back in the beginning of the battle. Then Borch and his talk about putting her in charge. It wasn’t what she had initially wanted for herself, but it was hers now.

The problem was…the problem was that she suspected she wasn’t much good at it. She wanted to grab Geralt’s sword and go through the portal. Cut the bitch into bloody ribbons. But this wasn’t an ordinary witch and she was prepared to battle a sorceress. If Yennefer stepped through the portal there would be two hostages for the witch to torment Geralt with.

The miasma of darkness seemed to ooze out from the portal, ignoring her protections. Witch magic. More subtle than sorcery. It dragged her down, made her want to drop her defenses and step into the room. Savagely, Yennefer thrust it away.

“Oh, Yennefer of Vengenberg. We are two of a kind, now, I think. I have waited to play this game with you for so long. I think about you every day. I dream about you at night. Not even your lover can lure you out, let us raise the stakes, make the game more even. Bard, you may follow her orders as well as mine.”

“You can go to blazes. I’m not following anyone’s orders.”

The witch smiled. It was a cruel game. Jaskier didn't know what the collar would do to him. She had only commanded him to do as he already intended.

Yennefer could command him, and Jaskier would obey, unless countermanded by the witch. At that point, the surprise value of the game would be lost, and that is when she would begin commanding him to hurt himself, and Geralt.

The look of anticipation in the witch’s eyes was almost sexual. It was obscene. The woman licked her lips, running her eyes over Gerald's naked, bleeding body. Her gaze returned to Yennefer's, inviting her next move.

“You want me,” said Yennefer. “Let the bard take the witcher down and I'll come to you.”

The woman laughed. It was a sound that sent shivers scraping down Yennefer's spine. _Yes. Come to me_. There wasn't a featherweight of sanity in it. Was the woman possessed? Sometimes it happened to witches, when they set themselves against a greater power, trying to save a soul.

Not an area she had much experience with. Another witch might have had the remedy. Geralt would have cut his way through the barrier and run her through with his silver sword. That would have driven the demon out. Assuming his sword had pierced nothing vital, the woman would have survived. Damn. I should have given the bard Geralt’s sword.

No. Not true. Geralt’s sword hadn’t done him any good. The tree branches were living, growing. The witch was not dead to the Mother. Gods, I wish Triss were here. She’d know what was going on.

“There’s no further need of him. He was just the lure.” Yennefer pointed out. “If you have me, isn't that all that matters?”

“Noooooo!” The woman's rage-filled shriek drilled into her ears like a banshee’s scream. “He must be made to pay. He killed my love! He must suffer oh yes, he has suffered for it. He has paid the price and so will you.”

Yennefer could feel the drain on her, as the dimertium ate away at the portal and she was forced to concentrate on keeping it intact.

If I lose him, if I lose them...

The bard's face was white with the strain of holding Geralt. As she watched, his lips thinned and his expression turned mulish. His arms tightened around Geralt’s hips and his eyes closed, little other than pure stubbornness keeping him upright.

Geralt's muscle density made his body quite heavy. Yennefer remembered times when she had awakened beneath him, struggling to breathe, forced to squirm into a position that was less uncomfortable.

“Poor little bard. Is he heavy, the Witcher? Such a burden to both of you.”

_So heavy…lay the burden down…_

“Shut up! Yennefer, do something!”

“Yennefer. Do something,” the witch mocked. “You are taking too long.” Her eyes narrowed. “Hoping for something to happen? For someone to slay the monster for you? There are some monsters that can never be slain. Even when they are is dead. I will show you his power!” Her voice rose to a hysterical, sobbing scream. “See the power of the dead. Bard! Take your dagger. Cut the Witcher’s eyes!”

Jaskier's hand rose and sliced across Geralt's eyes. Blood and clear fluid sprayed outward.

Geralt's agonized scream echoed off the stones.

Jaskier was sobbing uncontrollably. "I'm sorry! I'm sorry!"

"Let *go* of me Jaskier!" Geralt begged hoarsely.

"Don't let him fall," hissed the witch. "Make him live. He will live until *she* comes..."

"Yen." Geralt's voice was high with pain. "Yennefer?"

"Your lover calls for you," the witch sing-songed. "In his despair, he calls for you. Can you truly be so heartless as to leave him dangling, bleeding, dying in this cold prison cell?"

"I'm here, Geralt." She kept her voice calm, so that he would know he didn't have to worry about her doing anything foolish and emotional. _I will burn that bitch. I will make her death last for days._

"I have one last request, Yen."

"Anything." She meant it.

"Yennefer...bleed for me. Then call him back."

She knew immediately what Geralt was asking for. She wished she didn't. _He’s right. It’s time._ "Jaskier. Look at me," Yennefer commanded.

The bard's terrified eyes met hers.

"Trust me, Jaskier. Do as I say." _He’ll never forgive…but it wouldn’t matter…_ She drew a knife and raised it to her wrist. Witches were familiar with using bloodletting as a means of gathering power. Yennefer was hoping the witch's attention would be focused on her misdirection until too late.

"Listen to her, Jaskier." Geralt's voice could barely be heard. “Do exactly as she says. Don’t think about it.”

_I’m sorry, Geralt. For both of us…_

The witch leaned forward; her eyes fever bright. "Such a clever girl," she crooned. "What's she going to try next? Oh, it is such fun..."

"Slice his throat!" Yennefer commanded.

The knife slashed upward...

"Freeze!" screamed the witch. "Bitch! That wasn't clever. I had expected you to do something clever. That wasn't fun!"

A new score mark dripped from Geralt's throat. Jaskier's effort had struck true, but not swiftly enough.

The bard's eyes were shell-shocked and filled with horror. Horror at what the witch made him do, and with what Yennefer had almost made him do. Yennefer cursed herself. Why did I do that? But she knew the answer...it had been an emotional reaction to Geralt’s pain. She had accepted that there was no scenario which would not lead to Geralt's death, at least. _I gave up on us both_. It was the miasma of hopelessness that reached into her, touching that part of her that already wanted to die.

No…she had known the witch could countermand her order. Hadn’t she?

 _Think, Yenn_. Borch had sent them to this. He must have seen the result. There will be a way out. The witch’s lover, a dead lover? He was the key to unraveling the witch. “So the only reason you want me is to make the witcher suffer?” Yennefer guessed. Her lover must have been a demon or incubus or perhaps a sorcerer who dabbled in summoning. Geralt had killed a few of those as well.

“You must suffer as well!” The witch’s limbs were twitching, her hands opening and closing as if they were claws. “The witcher killed him for your sake. Severed his head from his body,” she wailed.

There was something in her voice that reminded Yennefer of...of course. The crow. The flapping of wings.

The more powerful witches could take other shapes. When Geralt had beheaded the Niflgaard sorcerer, the witch had witnessed it as she perched nearby in the form of a crow.

Suddenly, as Yennefer stared at the woman it all made perfect, terrible sense. Her fear left her. _I know what I need to do_.

“All right,” she said. “I know that you need me to come to you, and I understand why you feel the way you do. You need to finish it.”

Yennefer stepped through the portal.

The dimertium immediately blanketed her. She breathed it into her lungs. Without her magic to keep it open, the portal collapsed. Dimertium closed around her, cutting her off from her power. Panic flared.

“See. I'm giving you what you want,” she told the witch. “No power. Just me. Open a doorway through the roots and let me come through to you. Then you can do whatever you want to me. It will be everything that you have been waiting for, I promise you.”

“You think you are so clever, Piglet, yes, I remember that is the name he gave you. You think once you get close to me you can stick a knife between my ribs, or overpower me. But I am stronger than you know.”

The wall of living vines writhed obscenely, from underneath came tentacles of decaying wood that bulged outward and parted. Like a woman's cunt, opening for her. Yennefer stepped inside.

“Do something,” the bard gasped. Beads of sweat rolled down to soak his collar.

Geralt's shirt was soaked with blood. His neck was rigid with pain.

“Kill me, then,” Yennefer invited. “Put your fingers around my throat. Squeeze until I cannot breathe, then stay your hand. Make my torment last. It is what he would have wanted you to do, wouldn’t he? Avenge him. Here I am.”

Almost there...

The woman's skin rippled and darkened. Muscles bulged. Her hair thickened and grew small leaves. Her eyes turned brown. _A walker._ The witch had multiple forms; a frighteningly powerful woman. “Your death will wait upon a million heartbeats in torment,” she promised. Her voice had grown deep and scratchy. Yennefer felt the witch’s fingers tighten around her neck.

... Now...


	3. Dealing With Issues

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Geralt is blind. Jaskier is trapped. Yennefer has walked into the witch's den. Can her plan save them?

Yennefer's hand darted up. She seized the cloth encircling the woman’s throat and yanked with all her strength.

The fabric ripped and came away in her hands.

“Aaaaugh!” The witch's thin wail was more than a scream. It was the pent-up sound of a horror too deep for words to express.

A witch was bound to do no harm. To heal wounds and soothe pain. What horrors had she been forced to participate in, or even to watch? From what Yennefer remembered of the sorcerer, he would have enjoyed violating her in ways unspeakable to the witch. Every act of weal flaying another strip from the woman's soul.

Wooden fingers from the woven shield reached for the witch, her own power turning on her, crabbed instruments of vengeance that drove in with fury. Yennefer threw the woman to the ground and shielded her with her own body.

She felt the wood strike her, painfully but doing no injury. Even in her insanity the witch would not willingly harm another, unless magically compelled.

“Are you crazy?!” shrieked Jaskier. “Kill her!”

“Kill me,” the witch echoed.

“Not...an option right now.” Yennefer grabbed the woman's head between her hands and slammed downward with all her strength and fear. The woman slumped. The animated vines crumbled into a pile of decaying detritus on the floor. Yennefer struggled to her feet.

Curse it...where were the fucking keys?

Jaskier’s face was gray. His arms were soaked with Geralt's blood.

Yennefer groped frantically at the women's clothing. There...her questing fingers felt the slender bit of metal. She yanked it free and flew across the distance that separated her from the two men.

_Please. Please._

One manacle snapped open, then the other. Geralt's body slid to the floor. Jaskier’s head cracked against the stones as he tried to cushion Geralt's landing.

Yennefer ripped cloth from her inner shift; it was the most likely to be clean, and wrapped it around Geralt's eyes.

“We've got to get them out of here.” _I need access to my power. We need a portal._ “She may have mundane allies and none of us are up to taking them on.”

Jaskier wiggled out from under Geralt and rose unsteadily to his feet. “Are you insane?” he repeated. “I mean, I could see how you'd feel sympathy for her. She’s just your type” He picked up the dagger, staring at the bloody blade like a man trapped in the ninth level of hell. He swallowed. “I’m going to kill her. If you get in my way I'll... I'll knock you aside.”

Odds are he could manage it. He outweighed her and had a man's upper body strength. However, she knew quite a few dirty fighting tactics from the time she had to defend herself in Vengerberg. “Don't make me hurt you, Jaskier. Look, we're wasting time. We need to get him to a place of safety.”

“It will take two to carry him. And if we leave her behind without killing her she'll come for us again and it'll be worse this time, I keep telling him that and he never listens...” Jaskier's voice was rising. Exhaustion and hysteria was claiming him. He kept rubbing at his arms, not realizing that it just smeared the blood around more.

“Geralt told you to trust me.” As soon as she said it, Yennefer realized it had been the wrong thing to remind him of.

“And you told me to kill him,” Jaskier yelped. “I almost did it. I almost killed him,” he moaned. “I'm getting him out of here. You two unreasonably beautiful but psychologically evil bitches can work it out between you.” He grasped Geralt by the shoulders and begin hauling him out the door.

I need to find a way to keep her unconscious. Even now the detritus of her wooden barrier kept twisting and jerking, as if it was still trying to reach her.

_She wants to die. Why not let her?_

Because I've been in that place. Someone stopped me, and showed me that it can come out all right. As Tissaia had saved her, so she might save this tortured woman. If Geralt hadn’t saved me, what would I have eventually become? And if the woman could be saved, she could restore Geralt’s eyes. All Yennefer had to do was keep the woman from killing herself long enough for her to heal.

The witch was still wearing her walker form. It would make her skin tough and bark-like. Probably won't hurt to drag her. Yennefer grabbed the woman's legs and took her out the same door that Jaskier had dragged Geralt through.

Corpses littered the vast room. Old blood, a foul sweetness that had the room buzzing with flies and dead meat. It was meant to be a dining hall, with a massive, oval shaped table that could probably fit three dozen comfortably. Geralt must have escaped the witch’s grasp at least once and they had tried to stop him. Past the dining hall was a wide corridor and beyond that a staircase going down.

She could see Jaskier standing helplessly at the top of the staircase. He’ll never be able to drag Gerald down without injuring him further. As she watched, he dropped to the floor, cradling Geralt's head.

He tensed at her approach.

The miasma of dimertium was much thinner out here. She might be able to support Geralt's weight magically. But she didn't want to have to keep an eye on both the bard and the witch, knowing that a moment of relaxed vigilance could result in the witch’s death.

“Need a little help?”

The look he gave her brimmed with bitterness. “First chance you get, you abandon him for another of your kind. Not surprising.”

Time to shake a little sense into the pup. “You're not much for long-term planning, are you, Dandilion?”

“Not the kind of plans you make.”

Yennefer's patience was wearing thin. “He's blind, Jaskier. Not snow blind, not worm blind, just blind. His eyeballs are gone. How, exactly, do you plan on dealing with that?”

“Same way I deal with any of his injuries. Get him a room, get him the meal, get him a bath, get him a healer. This isn't the first time I've done this, you know. I just don’t have the need to grandstand about it.”

That stung a little. “Then what?”

“Then he's healed and refreshed and he goes forth to slay another monster.”

“How good do you think he's going to be at his job like this? How's he going to kill monsters if he can't see them?”

“I said I'd get a healer.”

“Your healer will give him a couple of glass eyeballs and something for the headaches.”

“I'll find a better healer.”

Maybe Jaskier would, at that. He'd shown no lack of persistence. “We can't afford to wait that long. He's got a job to do.”

“The man's been blinded for your sake and all you can think of is the job? The songs have it all wrong. It isn't the witchers who have no hearts, it's the ones who hire them,” Jasper said bitterly. He turned his head away from Yennefer and she could see tears trickling down his cheeks.

“I'm going to take the witch outside, brush the dust off as best I can, then come back and help you carry him out.”

His hand twitched. She could see him flipping her off.

 _All right, let's give this one last try_. “Jaskier, the witch is powerful. Scary powerful. If anyone can restore his eyes to full function, it's her.”

He plucked at his bloody sleeves for a moment, then his hands curved around Geralt's face.

Must have ripped the boy’s heart to shreds, being chased off the way he was. It was almost painful to see the bard's love so openly on display.

“She tried to kill us. She's evil. And too powerful to take chances with.”

“She's much more of a victim of this than any of us. Pull your head out of your ass, Jaskier. Until I ripped this,” she dangled the strip of green cloth in front of him “off her neck, she had no choice in anything she did. It drove her mad. She’s no danger to us now. The only question is whether there's enough left of who she was to save her. If I can do that, she can help him.”

Without another glance at Jaskier, she turned her attention back to the witch, who still did not appear to be moving. Unconscious? Or playing possum? _It's what I would do._

 _I badly need a potion or two. Too bad I couldn't have come up with an escape strategy that didn't end up with the portal gone and me covered with dimertium._ Yennefer dragged the witch’s body over the lip of the stairs and down. Her body thudded at every step. Finally, Yennefer reached the doorway, which was empty. The door was splintered.

It was raining outside. That was good. Yennefer stripped off her clothing and dropped it in a nearby puddle. _This is going to be unpleasant_. She found a slick patch of mud and rolled in it, thoroughly coating herself. Using the mud as an abrasive, she scrubbed at her skin. Then she found another patch of mud and rolled again.

She could feel chaos seeping through her skin, filling her. Slowly. It wasn't like the time she had burned herself out in Soddem, or not much. The dimertium had blocked her from external chaos, and trapped her internal energy, not expended it.

She crafted a spell of sleep and thrust it into the woman’s mind with all the energy she could muster. It wouldn’t keep her unconscious if she was hurt or someone screamed in her ear, but hopefully it would be enough.

 _Ugh. I’m going to need a bath_. But she didn’t have the energy to spare for personal grooming. Time enough for clean-up later. Yennefer strode back inside the keep.

At the sight of her, Jaskier’s whole face lit up. Then he frowned and peered at her. His eyes widened, as welcome changed to horror.

“What? You've never seen a naked woman covered in mud before?”

“I thought you were one of the Zerrikanians.” His disappointment was amusing.

She supposed she ought to be flattered. They were quite handsome, Borch's two companions. Yennefer called chaos to her fingertips, sucking it from her inner reserves, converted it to kinetic energy and lifted Geralt's body up.

Jaskier was left staring at his empty lap. His hands fell to his side.

He was too painfully easy to read. It must have been one of the things that drove Gerald to drink.

That and me, she amended with a snort. Like having hot and cold applied to your penis at the same time. Poor man.

She laid Geralt down beside the witch. _Time is not on my side. If she wakes up, she'll have her powers. Not sure if I'm up to restraining her. If she was a sorceress I would know her tricks and I could counter them_. A witch's tricks were different.

Yennefer knelt in the mud, fished a knife out of her discarded boot and begin to shave off hunks of her hair. It was the last source of dimertium still touching her body and she didn't have time to try and work the substance out from between the thick strands. She’d need every advantage to create a portal which would carry passengers as far as the Dragon Mountains. Portals required precision as well as power and the dimertium was distorting her control.

At last she was done. She bent down and used the mud to scrub her truncated hair clean.

“Why are you doing this?” Jaskier watched her from the doorway, a frown of fascinated horror on his face. “Is it some sort of ritual? Or have you gone mad?”

“To get the dimertium off,” she snapped impatiently. “The upstairs was filled with it.” Yennefer snapped her fingers and a spark appeared, dancing on the tips of her nails. She used it to prime another spell, sending waves of warmth down to blanket Geralt.

“So you stepped through the portal knowing you would be helpless, without your power, when you got to the other side?”

“I stepped through because I had a plan. You should try it sometime.” She threw her hands out, feeling the dizzying rush of power as a portal appeared in front of her. It fought her, wavering like a heat mirage. Finally, it seemed to stabilize. Home, and safety, were a footstep away. She used a touch of kinetic to carefully levitate the woman.

She could carry Geralt as well.

But…that wouldn’t be fair, would it? _The bard deserves to be allowed to finish the task he has fought so hard for_. “Bring him through as quickly as you can. The longer you delay the more chance that something will go wrong.”

Yennefer stepped through the portal.


	4. Looking For Healing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Geralt is badly hurt. So is Jaskier. Yennefer realizes that she can't heal either of them.
> 
> She can only look for help from the only person she knows to ask right now and hope it will be enough.

Yennefer carefully laid the witch on her bed. Something was keeping the woman unconscious, although Yennefer couldn’t tell what it might be. The witch’s fingers trembled and the muscles of her face twitched.

Can’t leave this to chance. She must be restrained until I can figure out what to do. Yennefer wondered where Borch was.

There was a magical potion that Triss had made her, years ago, from rose hips, the petals of yew trees, and probably other things she didn't want to know about. Yennefer used it to get to sleep when she was feeling restless and sometimes when she wanted to encourage someone else into sleep without their knowledge. It was tasteless and smelled faintly sweet.

She snatched the bottle off her side table, twisted out the cork and poured a generous portion between the witch’s lips using a bit of force to stimulate her throat to swallow. The woman began to cough and her eyes flew open. She rolled off the bed and fled toward the open portal.

Yennefer sent a glowing line of force out to yank the woman back down on the bed. The woman shrieked and fought. “I'll kill you! First chance I get, I'll slaughter you like a pig in a killing chute!”

Yennefer bound her limbs with concentric bands of force, then covered her eyes. She sat down on the bed. “No. I don't think you will. What's your name?”

By way of answer the woman cursed her inventively in a number of languages. Then, suddenly the woman was a woman no longer, only a large black crow. The transformation caused her bonds to slip away, no longer matching the cast target. The bird launched itself at Yennefer, driving straight at her head with a hoarse scream of rage.

Yennefer refused to flinch. At the last possible moment, the bird pulled its claws in. They scraped across Yennefer's cheek and the rush of air pulled by the wings buffeted her face.

Again, the witch tried for the portal. Her powerful wings beat frantically against the air; Yennefer’s spell loops caught her just short of her goal and yanked her back.

The birds struggled and cried out, its frantic struggles growing weaker and more unfocused until at last it lay, wingtips twitching and flapping listlessly. The crow’s beak opened as if in supplication, and the crow’s head rolled back limply. The bird's eyes closed.

“I wish you had told me your name,” Yennefer murmured. Names had power, and she needed a way to reach that part of the witch that had existed before she was trapped by the sorcerer. Perhaps Jaskier would know. The woman was powerful, and with witches that usually meant ancient. Ancient meant history, and that's what bards excelled at, if they could be said to excel at anything useful. Speaking of the bard, she'd still seen no sign of him or Geralt. The portal still blazed with energy, and open invitation for anyone to step into her private sanctum.

_I swear if you've taken him and run off, I'll hunt you down and roast your chestnuts over a fire._

As if in answer to her thoughts, the portal flickered and Geralt staggered through, kept upright only by Jaskier’s shoulder. There was a flash of resentment in Jaskier’s eyes when he saw that the single bed in the room was occupied by a bird.

Easily enough remedied. With a gesture, Yennefer dismissed the portal and picked the bird carefully up. “Put him on the bed.”

“That was my intention.” The bard's voice was distorted, as if he was clenching his teeth. Geralt barked his knees against the bed, wincing, then leaned down to stroke his hand over the silk coverlet to identify it. “I can manage.” He allowed himself to collapse.

If there was ever a time in her life that she wanted to be alone with the man, this was it. She ached at the sight of him. There were potions that would steal the purple from his bruises, close his open wounds, heal internal damage.

But his eyes...oh, his beautiful, fierce witcher eyes.

She gathered up the feathers from the pillow she’d shattered in anger earlier, and used them to tuck the crow into a tiny nest in her top drawer. Then she did a cleansing spell and dressed herself in something regal. For this she was going to need Triss, and when last seen Triss had been at Soddem. This meant she’d have to deal with Foltest, who was hardly likely to give aid or courtesy to an underdressed trollop, however powerful. She draped her shaved head in a richly embroidered scarf.

There was more than one healing that needed to be done tonight, though, and like the good general that Borch had elected her to be, she needed to find a way to balance the needs of all.

Yennefer opened the beveled door of a cabinet fastened to the wall. The lilac drought would be best to start with; it would be better coming from her. A small clay jar with crimson glaze and a plain wooden box filled with dust would do for the rest. She set them on the table beside the bed. “Help me get him straightened out.”

Without argument, Jaskier helped to drag him up until the full length of Geralt’s body sprawled across the royal blue coverlet. His head moved from side to side, trying to focus on sounds. His ruined eyes still leaked a constant trickle of blood.

“Geralt, I want you to do a favor for me.” She sat on the bed, close enough that their bodies fitted together, hip-to-hip.

“I'm not going to like this, am I?” His voice was raspy with pain.

“If you did, then the favor would go the other way, wouldn't it?” She lifted the lilac drought close enough that the scent of it invaded his nostrils, knowing that he would recognize it. To her surprise, he didn't protest. Normally, Geralt hated to be drugged.

“Are we safe?” he asked.

“Reasonably. The witch will be unconscious for a while. I'm going to try to find Triss.”

“I doubt she can do anything for me.” His tone was bleak.

“But Triss might be able to help with the witch. She's an ancient, Geralt. Two forms that I saw and one of them a walker.” The walkers were an ancient form of tree-spawn that had been nearly eradicated from the world for reasons that had yet to be determined. As far as she knew, they hadn’t been seen in two hundred years.

“You hope to bind her?” His voice was carefully neutral.

“I hope to save her. You remember the collar you removed from my neck? I wasn't his only slave. But she must have been at his mercy for years, maybe even decades. If I let her slip from my fingers she will die at her own hand.”

His fingers clenched around her wrist. “Don't take chances, Yen. Half a witcher is better than none, and if you died neither of us will have anything.”

Yennefer froze at the implications of what he was offering. Blinded, Gerald would be helpless. He would be completely helpless. And he had just offered to live. “A princely offer.” Her fingers curled around his. “I don't know that I could make the same offer, if our circumstances were reversed.”

“Neither could I match yours. I couldn't keep you safe, Yen. Not and do my job.”

The breath caught in her throat. “I hope you won't have to make any such sacrifice.” She reached over and touched her fingers to the side of his mouth.

His mouth open and he wrapped his hand around her waist as she emptied the potion bottle. He swallowed.

She waited with him until the hand gripping her loosened and dropped, dangling slack over the edge of the bed. She reached for it, then let it lie. Give Jaskier something to do. Tuck him in, fuss over him. She rose and looked for the bard.

Jaskier was tucked into a corner of the room, between a bookcase with an ornately carved top face and the domed dragon chest half the height of a man. His arms were crossed against his chest and his eyes were tightly hiding his pain.

 _It will take us some time to get ourselves sorted_. She hoped Jaskier would meet her halfway or she'd eventually be moved to drop him off a cliff. “I'm off to find a healer. Unless you want to do that.”

“You be much better at it, I'm certain,” he told her without a ripple of inflection. “I'll stay and tidy up.”

“Come here, then.”

For a moment it looked as if he would refuse, then he crossed the room to stand beside Geralt's bed.

She handed him the box and the jar. “The powder is for open wounds. Sprinkle a tiny bit, then wait and let it be absorbed by the flowing blood. Stop when the powder stays visible. The ointment is for bruises and internal injuries. He's going to have a lot of them, so...it will take you a while to find them all.”

He took them, a look of confusion on his face.

 _He expects me to be territorial_. Jaskier never understood her relationship with Geralt. _He probably thought the only reason Geralt didn't turn to him was because of me_. But Geralt was complicated. He didn't like entanglements. The life of a witcher wasn't suited to them. Her independence was one of the things that appealed to Geralt. He wanted her to be strong, needed her to be strong, so then he didn't have to worry that she would be hurt when he left.

Jaskier’s psychological makeup was different. From what Yennefer had observed, he wanted to be adored, longed to be needed. And the stronger his need, the more Gerald had to push him away.

“What about the witch?”

“She'll sleep. I've drugged her quite thoroughly. If she’s dead when I get back I’ll portal you about fifty miles straight up.”

“If you die, how do we get out of here?”

“There are handholds cut into the rock to the left of the balcony.” Never mind that you'd have to be a monkey to make proper use of them. “There's water trickling in the basin and dried foods in the green basket.”

He nodded, only halfway listening. His eyes were fastened on Geralt's unconscious body as he seated himself carefully on the bed.

Yennefer created a portal to Soddem, and stepped through, shutting it behind her.

The battleground swarmed with activity. Foltest’s men were most numerous; a half dozen of them lined up and snapped crossbows on the ready as she stepped through, but didn't fire. Disciplined.

She waited patiently until a man with the insignia of Captain strode forward. “Please identify yourself, lady,” he requested. Courteous but wary.

“Yennefer.”

His eyes widened. “King Foltest has been looking for you, lady. Please, if you would come with me.”

Might as well, Yennefer thought. If anyone could know where Triss is, or Tissaia, it would be him. She followed the captain through the rubble of Soddem Hill. Here and there, blue flags flapped briskly in the wind, the triple fleur-de-lis boldly proclaiming his triumphant possession.

A possession had we already won before he came to claim it, thought Yennefer. Where was he when we were being slaughtered by Nilfgaarian arrows?

Just behind the crest of the hill a triple sized tent was set up, obviously battle headquarters. Men streamed in and out, like a swarm of ants. Their uniforms were clean and freshly crisp, a sure sign that the actual fighting was over and the army was on to the parading about and beating of the chests.

Yennefer, you are in a bitch of a temper today. But rein it back. More flies with honey than vinegar, especially when it came to kings.

The captain entered the tent and moved swiftly to the Eastern end, where a large table had been set up with a patchwork of connecting maps spread over the scarred surface of the wood. Nilfgaard, all the way down to Zerrikania and the City of the Golden Towers.

She hoped Foltest wasn't such a fool as to think he could invade Nilfgaard. 

“Your majesty.” The captain waited until Foltest had raised his head for before continuing “The sorceress Yennefer.”

Rather foolish of him to take her at her word and bring her before his king. The frowns of the king's companions told her that Foltest hadn't surrounded himself with fools.

At least three of the men in the tent were sorcerers. Yennefer felt the thrum at of their power, examining her. Well, that would confirm she was a sorceress, nothing more.

“Lady Yennefer.” Foltest gave her a bow that was slightly too deep. He recognized her, of course. She had been no stranger to his court at one time. “You have not changed at all.”

“Not to the eyes, Majesty. But war changes us all.” She resisted the urge to rub at her scars.

“Well said. Welcome back. A sorceress of your power is always welcome.” There was a question in his voice. He knew better than to take her for granted.

“I'm looking for Triss Meregold.” She found it was best to be blunt with Foltest. He had no patience for indirection or misdirection.

A frown cast shadows across his dower, bearded face. “She’s dead,” he told her.


End file.
